They Are Circling The Wagons Against Bysiewicz

It was 1998, the dot com boom was in full swing and the  state Democrats were holding their convention and desperately trying to avoid an all white ticket. The position on the Democratic slate for secretary of state was being battled between Ellen Scalettar and Susan Bysiewicz at the nominating convention and in a rollcall vote, convention delegates nominated Ellen Scalettar for Secretary of State. with Ellen Scalettar pulling in 849 votes to  Susan Bysiewicz’s 613. But Bysiewicz really, really wanted to be secretary of state. So she filed to primary, and then launched what Dems like to refer as the meanest attack campaign against a fellow Democrat.

According to the New Haven Register, Bysiewicz claimed Scalettar missed nearly 200 votes in the General Assembly, including one on campaign finance reform in television ads. The ads also suggested that Scalettar voted against the Connecticut version of  ”Megan’s law,” and supported sex offenders. None of which was true, Bysciewicz went on to defeat Scalettar in the primary, and on to win her current position of Secretary of State. After all the dust settled, The Hartford Courant said in a November 6, 1998 editorial entitled Tasteless Tampering with the Truth;

“Susan Bysiewicz, Democratic victor in the secretary of the state race against Ben F. Andrews Jr., was the queen of mean. She earned that reputation with an attack ad against state Rep. Ellen Scalettar in the September primary. Ms. Bysiewicz’s tactics involved taking a germ of truth and distorting it to manipulate voters.”

Now things aren’t looking so good for Bysiewicz as the issues about her active lawyering are still in question after current AG Dick Blumenthal punted. To compound matters, the latest report has Bysiewicz using the excuse of an FOI request to obtain the emails of anyone who has ever contacted the Secretary of State’s office for use for her campaign. Jon Lender, at the Courant, breaks the details:

Her 2010 election committee has been sending unsolicited e-mails to thousands of people in that database, promoting her candidacy and seeking campaign contributions, The Courant has learned.

And now Bysiewicz’s private political use of her public office’s data has come under investigation by the state’s current attorney general, Richard Blumenthal. Two staff lawyers in his office are investigating a complaint lodged last October by a Republican political activist who received unwanted Bysiewicz campaign e-mails and charged that she has violated the law by misusing “official state data for a political campaign.”

Bysiewicz on Saturday confirmed Blumenthal is investigating her office but denied that anything improper happened. Blumenthal could not be reached for comment.

You can be sure that one word is passing the lips of long time Democratic operatives. Scalettar.

One of the things that quickly becomes apparent in politics is that job qualifications and stances on issues take a second seat to private vendettas based on perceived sleights. More so in Democratic politics than Republican politics, but I think that’s just an issue of numbers. What both parties fail to realize is that most voters, and we can point out the numerical numbers as unaffiliated don’t care who did what to whom in 1998 and beyond, because most voters would like candidates who actually have a clue about the issues.

Like being able to check off, yes, I’m an active lawyer, when you have to fill out forms to the state of Connecticut’s Client Security Fund. Bysiewicz not only didn’t, for three years beginning in 2006, but also in in 2007 and 2008 had the Secretary of States’s office submit the full fee of $110 for her. All this would be seemingly irrelevant but for the fact that if you want to run for Attorney General you have to be an active lawyer for at least 10 years.

The very people who still remember the Ellen Scalettar race of 1998, will not try and figure out if they want to bring Bysiewicz’s case to court and have it ruled upon.

Republicans actively watch and write in The Republican Heard:

Even Dick Blumenthal wouldn’t give her a green light on that whopper and issued a long “Dear Madame Secretary” letter saying only a court can defer what “active practice” means. This was a classic Blumenthal punt – which took him almost two weeks to figure out.

Bysiewicz, after hinting that she would abide by Blumenthal’s judgment, said she was vindicated and would press on in her quest to find a job that provides a car and full dental. No one is buying it, including the Democratic state Chairman Nancy DiNardo, who pondered where her party will seek a declaratory ruling from a Superior Court on the matter.

Meanwhile, Republican hopefuls State Rep. Arthur O’Neill, R-Southbury, State Sen. Andrew Roraback, R-Goshen and Easton attorney John Pavia, all have more than enough practice time.

Sometimes payback is a bitch.